Zhai-Liza (mother’s shoes) Sculpture, 2024. 72 × 72 × 114 cm. Polyester, polyamide, coating

Multidisciplinary visual artist Hans Op de Beeck has created several life-size sculptures of figures in recent years, including quite a few of children. Typically, these monochrome grey figures appear in a serene moment of play, silence, rest, concentration or sleep. With Zhai-Liza, and some other new child figures, Op de Beeck introduces a new, playful element, namely that of dressing up with costumes and props.
The girl, Zhai-Liza, seems to be in a domestic context because of the women's shoes she uses which probably came from her mother. The dancing dress, the fan, and mother's shoes, which are much too large, seem to give the extremely tiny fragile girl a feeling of empowerment, causing her to raise her chin with overconfidence.
Dressing up, playing with found or home-made clothes, outsized parental clothing, fancy dress costumes and props, is an age-old and universal part of being a child.